Project Goal: Develop an automated irrigation gate system for Bard Water District that adjusts irrigation flood gates remotely via a website and hardware components, providing the ability to cover more than 14,000 acres in crops and millions of dollars in product generation.

Bard Water District employees operate flood gates by hand on site using either an electric motor or by cranking the floodgate open with a lever. Manual floodgate operation creates extra workload. Furthermore, when irrigators close and open their turnout gates without notifying the Bard Water District, it can cause spillage into suburban areas and a lack of water for other irrigators.

In this design, an automated system adjusts floodgates and sends live data to Bard Water District. A group of encoder sensors delivers water-level and gate-position information via a tape, weight and float mechanism. The gate position is adjusted based on processor input with a DC electric motor wired through a series of motor starters. Remote terminal unit processors and VHF radio modems allow the control and transmission of system data.

All of the system’s components are powered with solar energy.

Project Goal: Automate the irrigation water distribution system used across 14,000 acres of agricultural land in Southern California.

To help prevent hazards and losses, this project developed an interactive website to depict and monitor the Yuma water area owned by Bard Water District.

After conducting trade studies of interactive exhibits, the team selected a remote terminal unit, or RTU, as the microprocessor. The configuration integrates simple, easy-to-use, RTU-compiling software. A position sensor and water-level sensor measure and predict gate position and cubic feet per second, or CFS, flow.

In real time, the microprocessor retrieves the output signal generated from the position and water level sensors at each of 10 gates and sends the information to a database. The resulting website enables designated Bard Water users to interact directly with the display. They can edit the amount of CFS at any gate as well as monitor gate position, on-off signal status, and open or closed gate status.

Project Goal: Produce a design concept report for improving Valencia Road from Old Vail Road to Nexus Road and at the Atterbury Wash.

The design concept improves the existing two-lane sections of Valencia Road to comply with modern standards for a four-lane, urban collector roadway with a center median and paved shoulders. The improvements also include intersection realignment, signalization, better drainage conveyance, vertical and horizontal geometry, and a new bridge over a major regional wash.

More transportation accessibility and options that increase public safety for the community are provided by adding ADA-compliant, bicycle-accessible paved shoulders and a continuous center turn lane for easier access and reduced traffic density. Topographic maps and hydraulic flows reveal the right design for the right lay of the land.

The team used roadway design, traffic analysis, geotechnical analysis and pavement design, structural design, utility coordination and relocation, while considering environmental and sustainability factors, cost estimation and scheduling. Balancing project cost, public needs and environmental protection results in a sustainable solution.

Project Goal: Create a design concept report for the Valencia Road corridor from Pantano Road to Nexus Road, including improvements at the Atterbury Wash structure.

This design concept proposes sustainable, solutions-oriented improvements to the two-lane Valencia Road. It calls for changing it to a fully functional, four-lane, urban collector roadway with a center median, paved shoulders and an ADA-accessible multiuse pathway.

Other improvements include horizontal and vertical roadway geometry, intersection realignments, traffic control elements, improved drainage along the entire corridor, and adjustments to the Atterbury Wash intersection structure. Engineering work includes roadway design, traffic analysis, hydrology and channel hydraulics, geotechnical analysis, pavement design, bridge and culvert design and analysis of alternative structures, utility relocation, environmental requirements, construction considerations, cost estimation and project scheduling. The team consulted more than 20 industry mentors to finalize the design concept report.

The increased capacity for this collector road benefits travel demand for the businesses along Valencia Road and for Mesquite Elementary School near Harrison Greenway.

Project Goal: Design improvements of Valencia Road from Pantano Road to Atterbury Wash.

The proposal will turn East Valencia Road in Tucson, Arizona, into a modern, four-lane, urban collector roadway with a center median. The plan includes the same improvements at the Atterbury Wash east of Houghton Road. These tie into improvements at the Pantano Road alignment and transition into existing conditions east of Nexus Road and at the signalized intersections at Old Vail Road and Nexus Road.

The plan includes enhancements to horizontal and vertical geometry, intersection realignments, traffic control elements, drainage conveyance, public safety improvements, reduced traffic congestions, bicycle accessible shoulders and ADA-accessible pedestrian pathways.

Concept recommendations adhere to the city’s standards for roadway design, traffic analysis, hydrology and channel hydraulics, geotechnical analysis, pavement design, culvert and bridge design, utility relocation, environmental requirements, cost estimating and scheduling. Also identified were potential project impacts to existing residential neighborhoods, businesses and other facilities. The project provided recommendations for additional improvements as needed.

Project Goal: For a mission to Mars, develop an ascent vehicle with mass constraints half that of typical proposals.

NASA is planning for an ascent vehicle to transport two astronauts and a payload of samples from the Mars surface back to a rendezvous spacecraft in low Mars orbit. The primary goal of the MARV-N project is to develop a minimum Mars Ascent Vehicle, or MAV, and identify key technologies and interfaces for meeting mission objectives. The MAV is scheduled to fly at the end of 2035, and it has a projected development budget of $2 billion per year for 10 years, totaling $20 billion.

A MAV design with a wet mass of less than 20,000 kg and a dry mass of less than 5,000 kg equates to half of what has been previously proposed. Development of critical systems and structural testing have advanced enough to allow a full proposal, including CAD designs for major structural components, propulsion system design, ascent planning and trajectory design, rendezvous and docking.

Project Goal: Design and manufacture an uncrewed, electric-powered aircraft with a towed sensor – to represent the University of Arizona at the 2021 Design, Build, Fly Competition.

In this competition, engineering students construct an aircraft with specific design constraints. The aircraft entry emphasizes speed, cargo-carrying capabilities and the ability during flight to fully deploy and retract a sensor with lights.

The design includes a high wing spanning 58 inches, conventional tail, and tricycle landing gear. The fuselage carries four cargo shipping containers and an additional container for the sensor. Mechanisms allow for fully deploying and retracting the sensor during flight. A single-engine propulsion system executes different mission types, enables aircraft maneuverability with the full payload, and overcomes the drag from the towed sensor.

Preliminary prototyping and flight testing verify that the design is aerodynamically feasible and stable. With the results of the flight tests, initial design parameters have been adjusted and refined for in-flight stability and control.

Project Goal: Collect, analyze and return samples from multiple locations on the lunar surface to the International Space Station.

Studying lunar composition provides valuable data about the formation of the moon, Earth and solar system. While much is still unknown, a method to collect samples and characterize surface magnetic anomalies of Reiner Gamma, a lunar swirl region containing high magnetic field strengths of unknown origin, would add to that knowledge.

This mission concept of operations features an orbiter from which a lander and rover make multiple descents to collect and store samples from various lunar surface locations and ascents to deliver the samples to the International Space Station. The rover is designed with two robotic arms for rapid sample collection, in-situ analysis of the samples, and expansive magnetic field measurements. An onboard computer controls immediate movements and data collections, while allowing scientists to plan and control its destinations and actions at the macro-level.

Once in lunar orbit, the lander, which contains the rover and sample return craft, lands and deploys the rover. The rover gathers samples and measurements, transfers them to the sample return craft and parks itself in the lander. The lander returns to the orbiter to refuel, and the sample return craft travels to the space station with its payload.

Project Goal: Design a repeatable mission architecture for collecting physical and sensor samples from lunar lava tubes and delivering them to the International Space Station.

The Lunar Acquisition Vehicle and Analysis, or LAVA, mission to study the geohistory of the moon plans to send an assembly of vehicles from Earth to explore lunar lava tubes located on the near side. Physical samples and sensor measurements are to be collected and taken to the International Space Station.

For this design, an orbiter and lander pair orbits the moon before the lander reaches the surface and deploys a modified version of the JPL DuAxel rover. The tethered rover uses a zipline to lower itself into the lava tube through a skylight and take samples that have been preserved for at least 3 billion years. The rover hands off the samples to the lander, which transfers them to the orbiter for delivery to the space station, where the orbiter also refuels.

To develop proof of concept, the team prototyped the zipline mechanism that Axel lowers into the lava tube. The assembly successfully demonstrates the design’s feasibility.

Project Goal: Safely deliver a crew of two astronauts from the surface of Mars into low Mars orbit.

NASA deems entry, descent and landing technology for reliable transportation to and from low-mass celestial bodies a high priority in space exploration. In an abort scenario, the vehicle must be adept at rising into orbit or landing on the surface, even at very high altitudes. Thus, this projects investigates deployable systems that produce high drag and reduce speeds during the abort sequence.

After taking into account the atmosphere of Mars, this team designed an abort system that uses a balloon-parachute technology known as a ballute, which can be more effective than standard parachute technology in the thin atmosphere. Ballute storage, deployment and inflation technology are used to employ atmospheric airflow alongside high tensile materials to create enough drag for a landing.

The system can stand alone or be coupled with a powered landing system.